Subtitle from cover

1100-1500. The Qingming scroll / Zhang Zeduan ; The lamentation of Christ / Giotto di Bondone ; The Madonna enthroned / Duccio di Buoninsegna ; The annunciation / Fra Angelico ; The Arnolfini portrait / Jan Van Eyck ; The baptism of Christ / Piero della Francesca ; The hunt in the forest / Paolo Uccello ; The birth of Venus / Sandro Botticelli -- 1500-1600. The garden of earthly delights / Hieronymus Bosch l; The great piece of turf / Albrecht Düer ; Mona Lisa / Leonardo da Vinci ; The school of Athens / Raphael ; Sistine Chapel ceiling / Michelangelo ; Bacchus and Ariadne / Titian ; The ambassadors / Hans Holbein ; Spring morning in the Han Palace / Qiu Ying ; Netherlandish proverbs / Pieter Bruegel the Elder ; Spring / Giuseppe Arcimboldo ; Cypress tree / Kano Eitoku ; Akbar's adventures with the elephant Hawa'i in 1561 / Basawan and Chetar -- 1600-1700. David with the head of Goliath / Caravaggio ; The judgment of Paris / Peter Paul Rubens ; Charles I on horseback / Anthony van Dyck ; Self-portrait as "La Pittura" / Artemisia Gentileschi ; Las meninas / Diego Velázquez ; Self-portrait / Rembrandt van Rijn ; The art of painting / Johannes Vermeer -- 1700-1800. Still life with flowers and fruit / Jan van Huysum ; Marriage à-la-mode : the marriage settlement / William Hogarth ; Mr. and Mrs. Andrews / Thomas Gainsborough ; Allegory of the planets and continents / Giambattista Tiepolo ; An experiment on a bird in the air pump / Joseph Wright of Derby ; The death of Marat / Jacques-Louis David -- 1800-1900. The Valpinçon bather / Jean-Auguste Dominique Ingres ; The third of May 1808 / Francisco de Goya ; Wanderer above the sea of fog / Caspar David Friedrich ; The hay wain / John Constable ; The fighting Temeraire / J.M.W. Turner ; The artist's studio / Gustave Courbet ; Olympia / Édouard Manet ; Arrangement in grey and black, no. 1 / James McNeill Whistler ; The dancing class / Edgar Degas ; A Sunday on La Grande Jatte / Georges Seurat ; Van Gogh's chair / Vincent van Gogh ; The child's bath / Mary Cassatt ; Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going? / Paul Gauguin ; The waterlily pond / Claude Monet -- 1900 to present. Lake Keitele / Akseli Gallen-Kallela ; The large bathers / Paul Cézanne ; The kiss / Gustav Klimt ; Composition VII / Wassily Kandinsky ; Berlin street scene / Ernst Ludwig Kirchner ; Northern River / Tom Thomson ; Red balloon / Paul Klee ; Red canna / Georgia O'Keeffe ; The metamorphosis of Narcissus / Salvador Dalí ; Guernica / Pablo Picasso ; Nighthawks / Edward Hopper ; Without hope / Frida Kahlo ; Red interior, still life on a blue table / Henri Matisse ; Autumn rhythm (number 30) / Jackson Pollock ; Untitled / Mark Rothko ; Marilyn / Andy Warhol ; To a summer's day / Bridget Riley ; The dance / Paula Rego ; Athanor / Anselm Kiefer

Features works from great artists through the ages including Zhang Zeduan, Rothko, and Botticelli; examines the story behind each piece; and explores the social context of each

Includes index

A sumptuous, visual guided tour of 66 of the world's greatest paintings, each examined in unrivaled depth. Ranging from works by Zhang Zeduan, a 12th-century Chinese master, to modern masterpieces by Rothko and Anselm Kiefer, this book provides an excellent visual introduction to the history of art in chronological order. Alongside a magnificent gallery of iconic paintings with more than 700 full-color photographs, the story behind each painting is fully explained, unlocking the meanings of symbols and historical details. Artists' biographies and features on historical and social context explore how landmark paintings were influenced by what went before them, and how they went on to inspire future artists. Paintings are analyzed visually through close-up details to help the reader understand the key features, composition, and techniques. Reading Great Paintings is like being taken around a gallery by a personal guide who helps you look at paintings--both familiar and new--in fresh and fascinating ways